Back in 1965, President Lyndon B. Johnson set up a commission to reform the nation’s criminal justice system. That work included looking at how police departments operate in black communities. Two years later, the commission had come up with a proposal to screen out prospective cops who are racist and prone to violence. It seemed like a no-brainer.
“Of equal importance with his education is a police candidate’s aptitude for the job: His intelligence, his moral character, his emotional stability, his social attitudes,” the Johnson report said. “The consequences of putting on the street officers who, however highly educated, are prejudiced, or slow witted, or hot tempered, or timid, or dishonest are too obvious to require detailed discussion.”
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